[ Warning ⚠️ : This Chapter contains gore scene and brutal Torture. If you’re uncomfortable, it is suggestesd to skip this Chapter]

No One’s POV

Alina opened her eyes to a dim flickering light.

The air was heavy with a foul smell that made her stomach twist. She tried to move, but her wrists and ankles were bound tight to a cold wooden chair. She looked down and saw she was still wearing the wedding dress, now wrinkled and stained with dried blood and mud. Her legs had been bandaged again, but they throbbed with a dull, constant pain.

As her vision cleared, she looked around the basement and let out a blood curdling scream.

In front of her laid a pile of horrific looking rotting corpses. She recognized their barely visible faces and the tattoo, they were the same men who worked under Elias.

These were the men she used to boss around and look down on. Now, their skin was a sickly grey, and their eyes were gorged out and hollow skull, staring back at her from the darkness.

The smell of decaying flesh was everywhere.

Suddenly, the heavy door at the top of the stairs creaked open.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The sound of footsteps echoed as someone came down. Alina watched with horrifying eyes as Dante emerged from the shadows. The cold, gloomy look in his eyes made her blood run cold. There was no love left in them, only a terrifying killing intent.

"Awake, my love?" Dante mocked, his voice echoing in the small room.

Alina shivered, her teeth rattling. In the past, those words would have made her heart flutter with joy. But now, she knew his real intentions. She looked at him and remembered how scary he truly was. He wasn’t her hero, he was the monster who had put her here.

"Dante... please..." she sobbed, pulling at the ropes.

He walked closer, the dim light making his face look like a mask of shadows. He didn’t say anything at first. He just stood there, looking at her in her white dress, surrounded by the dead bodies. He reached out and touched the lace of her sleeve with a cold hand.

"You look beautiful, Alina," he whispered, but his voice was like ice. "Just like a bride..... Corpse Bride"

Alina cried harder, her body shaking. She realized then that she was never going to leave this basement. Dante smiled, a slow and terrifying smirk, as he pulled a chair up to sit right in front of her. 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

"Now," he said softly. "Let’s talk about the secrets you and Elias thought you could keep from me."

"What secret! There’s no secret between him and me! Please Dante, trust me... I swear I don’t know anything!" Alina begged desperately. Her eyes were soaked in real tears this time, her face pale and glistening with sweat as she looked at him with desperate eyes.

"Hmmm, is that so?" Dante said, slowly pulling out his phone.

"Yes, yes! I am telling the truth! I only love you, Dante!" Alina cried, her voice cracking as she pulled against the ropes binding her to the chair.

"Then I wonder what this is..." He held up the screen, playing a video of her and Elias meeting behind his mansion.

Alina’s heart stopped. She remembered that day clearly. She had checked everywhere to make sure there were no CCTV cameras. It was the same day Viella had almost caught her before Dante and Lucian intervened

"How... you..." she stuttered, her breath coming in short gasps. "You knew everything? From the very beginning?"

Dante lowered the phone, a cold smirk playing on his lips. "I’ve always known, Alina. I just wanted to see how far you’d go."

Alina stayed silent for a second, then started to beg even harder, her voice reaching a frantic pitch. "Please Dante, trust me! I swear it’s him! Elias tricked me, that’s all! He made me believe him... he forced me to do everything! He’s the monster, not me! Please, just let me go, we can still be happy!"

"Sure," Dante whispered, his voice dangerously low. "After all, you weren’t the one who said..."

He pressed a button on his phone, and a crystal clear audio recording began to play. Alina’s own voice echoed through the damp basement, sounding sharp and arrogant.

"Dante is mine! He was always meant to be mine," the recording of Alina sneered. "I’m the female lead of this world. Everything. The money, the power, the Moretti name- it all belongs to me by right. That bitch Viella is just a side character in my story. Once I’m the mistress of this house, I’ll make sure everyone who looked down on me rots in the dirt."

Alina’s eyes widened until they were completely bloodshot. The air left her lungs as she listened to her own voice bragging about her destiny and her title as the main character. She sounded like a delusional villainess, the very thing she accused Viella of being.

She was so busted. There was no way back now. Every lie she had ever told was recorded, filed, and saved by the man she thought she was manipulating.

Dante leaned in close, his shadow covering her completely, the glint of the basement light reflecting in his cold, dead eyes.

"The female lead?" Dante whispered, his voice mocking and cruel.

"It seems you forgot one thing, Alina. In this story... I’m the one who decides who lives until the final Chapter, not your fellow writer of this world"

"Does that mean..." Her voice trailed off, her eyes widening with a horrific realization that chilled her to the bone. "You... you....knew everything?"

A dark smile appeared on Dante’s face as he leaned in. He looked completely unhinged, a psycho smile stretching across his lips as he whispered into her ear. "You’re right, Alina. I knew Everything this entire time. In fact It has always been me. I’ve been messing with the story exactly as I pleased. I’m not a pawn in your little game... I’m the one who wrote the rules."

Alina stayed silent, frozen in total shock. Her mind raced, if he knew he was in a story, then every "sweet" moment, every time he "saved" her from Viella, it was all a lie. He had been playing with her like a cat plays with a mouse before biting its head off.

"Now, shall we begin, my love~?" Dante said, his voice dropping into a sing song tone that made her skin crawl.

He slowly pulled on a pair of black surgical gloves, the latex snapping sharply against his wrists. "I can’t wait to start what I’ve been longing for since the moment you stepped into my house."

Suddenly, the dim basement flashes with white light. Alina blinked through the brightness, and her heart nearly stopped. Right next to Dante was a long metal table covered in a terrifying array of torture devices. Scalpels, pliers, jagged saws, and needles were laid out with surgical precision.

Her eyes widened in pure terror. She began to thrash against the ropes, her voice rising in a desperate, panicked scream. "No! Dante, please! I’ll do anything! I’ll leave! I’ll never come back! DON’T DO THIS!"

"Shhh..." Dante stepped closer, placing a cold, gloved finger firmly against her trembling lips.

He leaned in, his eyes glowing with a sick excitement. "Don’t ruin the surprise, Alina. A lead actress should always stay in character until the very end."

"Now, let’s start by returning a small favor," Dante whispered, his voice smooth and terrifyingly calm.

He picked up a syringe filled with a thick, neon yellow liquid. "I’ll feed you a drug just like you fed me. But instead of falling in love, you’ll feel your organs burning as if they’re on fire. Every inch of your insides will melt while you stay perfectly awake to feel it."

Without a second of hesitation, he jammed the needle into her neck and plunged the liquid into her veins.

For a few heartbeats, there was silence. Then, Alina’s eyes snapped wide. A guttural, strangled sound left her throat as the chemical fire began to spread. It felt like molten lead was pouring through her arteries, scorching her lungs and bubbling in her stomach.

Her body began to tremble violently against the chair, the wood creaking as her muscles locked in agony. She tried to scream, a high pitched piercing sound echoed the dark basement.

"You’re too loud, my love," Dante said, his psycho smile widening. "It’s time to silent those lips."

He reached for a thick curved upholstery needle threaded with black surgical wire.

Alina’s eyes filled with fresh tears, her head shaking frantically ’no,’ but Dante’s grip was tight. He grabbed her chin, forcing her head back.

Piercing.

The needle sank through her upper lip and then the lower.

Pull.

The wire dragged through the flesh with a sickening wet sound. Alina’s body jolted, her muffled screams vibrating against the thread as blood began to drip down her chin, staining the white lace of her wedding dress.

He didn’t stop until her mouth was a jagged, crisscrossed mess of black wire and raw meat.

"There," he breathed, his eyes dark with satisfaction. "Much better."

Next, he looked at her hands, the hands that had touched his arm, his clothes, and his face for months. His expression shifted into one of pure disgust. He picked up a heavy rusted hammer and thick steel pin.

He didn’t care about her muffled screams anymore, he was focused on her suffering.

He grabbed her left hand, forcing the palm flat against the thick wooden arm of the chair. He positioned the sharp point of the pin directly in the center of her palm. Alina’s eyes went wide, her body thrashing, but she couldn’t escape his iron grip.

THUD.

The first strike drove the pin through her skin. She let out a strangled shriek.

THUD.

The metal pierced through the muscle and bone, the sound of the pin splintering the wood underneath echoing in the cold basement.

He didn’t stop until the head of the pin was flush against her mangled flesh, pinning her hand permanently to the chair.

"One for the hand that decided to deceive me" Dante whispered.

He moved to her right arm. Alina was shivering in pain, her vision blurring from the intense pain. He repeated the process with a sickening rhythm.

THUD. THUD.

The second pin tore through her other palm, anchoring her completely. Fresh, hot blood surged from the wounds, running down the wooden arms of the chair and dripping onto the floor.

Dante stepped back, admiring the the pain he had inflicted. He wiped a spray of crimson from his forehead with the back of his gloved hand.

"Now you can’t run, and you can’t reach," he said, his voice dropping to a chilling, low tone.

"You’ll stay right here and feel every second of what comes next

"I couldn’t wait for this part," he hissed, his voice trembling with rage. "Every time you touched me, I felt like I was being crawled on by vermin. You are so filthy, Alina. So incredibly stagnant."

He then position the hammer against her finger.

CRACK.

The first blow landed on her index finger.

Alina’s muffled howl into sob.

CRACK. CRACK.

He didn’t stop until every bone in her fingers was nothing but shards of white calcium and red pulp.

He watched the blood splatter onto the white silk of her skirt, enjoying the contrast.

"You thought you were a queen?" he mocked, his breathing heavy. "You’re nothing but a parasite."

He turned away to a small brazier he had hidden in the corner. He pulled out a long, square headed hot iron rod.

He walked back to her, the glow of the iron reflecting in his manic eyes. "I hated every second I had to pretend to care for you. Every ’sweet’ word was a lie that tasted like ash in my mouth."

He pressed the hot iron directly onto her shoulder. The sound of sizzling flesh filled the room, accompanied by a thick smoke.

Alina’s body arched so hard it almost tipped the chair over. Her eyes rolled back, the pain of her melting organs combined with the external burning pushing her to the very edge of consciousness.

"This is for the way you looked at her," he growled, moving the iron to her other arm. "This is for every scheme you plotted against her."

The torture continued for what felt like hours. He used the scalpels to peel back strips of the wedding dress and the skin beneath it. He used the pliers to pull away the very things she was proud of, all while whispering his hatred into her ear.

The basement floor was a lake of blood and the once beautiful wedding dress was now a blood soaked rag.

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TO BE CONTINUED